The paragraphs 300-305 belong to the most controversially discussed
quotations of the Pope’s Francis Exhortation Amoris laetitia.
A suggestion appears in them, that people living a non-sacramental
unions can find themselves subjectively unable to act differently
without causing a new harm, though at the same time they are fully aware
that their present living conditions are objectively a grave sin. Such
people – so the Pope says – are not deprived of the divine grace and
could under some circum-stances received the sacraments. These
statements are interpreted in different ways. According to the first
interpretation the particular circumstances can change the moral
character of the person’s act so far that the life in a non-sacramental
union can no more be assessed as an adultery i.e. a grave sin. The
supporters of the second inter-pretation claim that the particular
circumstances could cause a grave moral constraint which – like other
forms of constraint too - can diminish one’s moral responsibility,
though his/her act remain objectively a grave sin. Eventually according
to the third interpretation the statements of Pope Francis are in the
present article related to the particular category of people living in
non-sacramental unions namely those ones who are subjectively convinced
that their first marriage was never valid.